It was built by the plans of Albert Schickedanz and Fülöp Herzog in an eclectic-neoclassical style [further explanation needed] , between 1900 and 1906. The museum's collection is made up of international art (other than Hungarian), including all periods of European art, and comprises more than 100,000 pieces. The collection is made up of older additions such as those from Buda Castle, the Esterházy and Zichy estates, as well as donations from individual collectors. The Museum's collection is made up of six departments: Egyptian, Antique, Old sculpture gallery, Old master paintings gallery, Modern collection, Graphics collection. The institution celebrated its centenary in 2006.
Collection and exhibits
Ancient Egyptian art
The gallery holds the second largest collection of Egyptian art in central Europe.[citation needed] It comprises a number of collections bought together by Hungarian Egyptologist, Eduard Mahler, in the 1930s. Subsequent digs in Egypt have expanded the collection. Some of the most interesting pieces are the painted mummy sarcophagi.
Classical antiquities
The core of the collection was made up of pieces acquired from Paul Arndt, a classicist from Munich. The exhibition mainly includes works from Ancient Greece and Rome. Most significant is the 3rd century marble statue called the Budapest dancer. The Cyprean and Mycenaean collection is also notable, also the ceramics and bronzes.
The collection's main section is devoted to pieces from the Middle Ages to the 17th century. It was based on the Italian collection of Karoly Pulszky and Istvan Ferenczy's bronze collections. From the latter came one of the most treasured works, the small equestrian by Leonardo da Vinci. A number of painted wooden sculptures feature in the German and Austrian section.
Drawings and prints
The collection shows selected rotating exhibitions of its collection of 10,000 drawings and 100,000 prints originating mainly from the Esterhazy, Istvan Delhaes and Pal Majovsky acquisitions. All periods of European graphic art are represented. Important pieces include two studies by Leonardo da Vinci for the Battle of Anghiari, 15 drawings by Rembrandt, 200 pieces by Goya, and French aquatints.
Art after 1800
Renaissance HallAerial viewGiambattista PittoniSt. Roch (1727), Oil on canvas, 42 x 32Corrado GiaquintoAllegory of Painting (1750), oil on canvas, 98 x 74
Hungarian artist, Victor Vasarely, donated a significant collection of his works to the gallery. These have found a permanent home outside the walls of the gallery at the Zichy mansion in Óbuda. The two-storey wing of the building is known as the Vasarely Museum and is the only one of its kind in eastern Europe.
This section needs to be updated. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information.(November 2023)
In 2008, the director of the Museum of Fine Arts, László Baán, proposed the merging of his museum with that of the Hungarian National Gallery, due to the similar exhibition and collection profile of the two. Both (along with the Ludwig Museum of Contemporary Art) specialize in 20th century and contemporary fine art, much of which was created by Hungarian artists living overseas.[1] After his request to add an €18million underground extension to the Museum of Fine Arts, which would have united collections spread across the city, was denied in February 2011, Baán presented an alternative plan to the government to build two new buildings at the cost of €150m. He envisioned the new buildings, one housing contemporary European art and the other Hungarian photography, as a "special museum island" that would complement the Museum of Fine Arts and the Budapest Art Hall (Műcsarnok) by permanently joining the two collections by 2017.[2]
In September 2011, Secretary of State for Culture Géza Szőcs officially announced plans to build a new structure along Andrássy út close to City Park and near the existing Budapest Museum of Fine Arts and Budapest Art Hall (Műcsarnok). This building would house the collections of the current Hungarian National Gallery.[3] This expanded plan, which would utilize the entire boulevard, is also referred to as the Budapest Museum Quarter or Andrássy Quarter.[4]
In early December 2011, Ferenc Csák, director of the Hungarian National Gallery since 2010 and critical of the proposed merger of the gallery with the Museum of Fine Arts, called the merge process "[v]ery unprofessional, anti–democratic and short–sighted" and announced that he would resign at the end of 2011.[5] As of 5 March 2012[update], a new director had not been named and the Hungarian National Gallery was being led by Deputy General Director, György Szűcs.[6]
^"Contact". Hungarian National Gallery. Archived from the original on 28 February 2012. Retrieved 5 March 2012.
Further reading
Van Dyke, John Charles (1914). Vienna, Budapest: critical notes on the Imperial Gallery and Budapest Museum. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. OL23356514M.
Garas, Klára, ed. (1988). The Budapest Museum of Fine Arts. Corvina. ISBN978-9-6313-4328-1.
Urbach, Susan; Varga, Agota; Fay, Andras (November 30, 2015). "Early Netherlandish Painting in Budapest". Distinguished Contributions to the Study of the Arts in the Burgundian Netherlands. Vol. I. Trunhout: Harvey Miller. ISBN978-1-909400-09-2.
Urbach, Susan; Varga, Agota; Fay, Andras (November 30, 2015). "Early Netherlandish Painting in Budapest". Distinguished Contributions to the Study of the Arts in the Burgundian Netherlands. Vol. II. Trunhout: Harvey Miller. ISBN978-1-909400-29-0.
